Review: Dishonored is stealthy, steampunk world-building done right

Victorian-era magical realism makes for a compelling sneaker that draws you in.

Game Details

Developer: Arkane StudiosPublisher: Bethesda SoftworksPlatform: PC (reviewed), PS3, Xbox 360Release Date: October 9, 2012Price: $59.99Links:Official website | Steam | Amazon
A lot of gamers are pretty quick to deride the game industry's penchant for milking successful franchises with sequel after sequel, extending the life of even moderately successful games rather than creating entirely new worlds from whole cloth. There's a reason for this, though. Creating new worlds is tough, and once you've gone through all that trouble, you want to get the most out of your investment. Dishonored shows just how tough that process is, primarily by building a world that's so well realized that even a lot of successful game worlds seem shallow and flat in comparison.

Dishonored doesn't waste any time drawing you into its richly detailed world. As royal protector Corvo Attano, you return from a mission on a far-off shore only to see the Empress murdered before your eyes and her daughter Emily (who shares a quickly established close relationship with Corvo), kidnapped by the perpetrators. Framed for the crimes, you quickly bust out of prison with the assistance of a small band of rebels who want to help you clear your name and restore Emily to her rightful place on the throne over a conniving Lord Regent. Doing this means donning a metallic mask and going out to eliminate key players in the country's social and political scene.

There's a real sense of injustice driving the plot forward that persists even as the story goes through some eminently predictable twists and turns later on. But while the plot falters, the game excels in creating memorable and well-fleshed-out characters. The rebel supporters who send you on your missions start off as stereotypical ciphers, but quickly develop into rich, believable characters with motivations and backstories that are brought to life by some quality voice acting. As you complete your quest you'll run into members of high society and ne'er-do-wells skulking around back alleys, all brought together to an extent by the need to deal with a rat-borne plague that has recently infected the country.

The environment is rich with details—everything from intricate wall posters to eavesdropped discussions about politics and personal problems—and you feel like you've been dropped into a place that will continue to go about its machinations long after you leave. The only real issue is that the supporting characters sometimes tend a little too much toward expository dialogue, indulging in an annoying habit of telling you what just happened, then telling you what's going to happen, then telling you what's happening again and how it relates to what's about to happen.

Dishonored's steampunk-infused mix of old-world sensibilities and modern trappings is also a lot more memorable than any of the by-the-numbers plot points that take place inside of it. The game crafts a downright elegant mixture of Victorian-era propriety with magical metal-and-wood technology, driven by an abundant supply of whale oil. You're just as likely to run into an old-fashioned, sword-wielding guard as an imposing, three-story-tall Tallboy walker that hurls grenades from atop steel legs. Old-fashioned, spring-loaded traps exist next to crackling, electrical "walls of light" that vaporize anything that gets too close.

It's pretty easy to look ridiculous when mixing different inspirations in this way (see Will Smith's Wild Wild West film, for one example), but the developers do a great job of walking the fine line between magical realism and over-the-top craziness. It's a balance that's only enhanced by the game's beautiful environments, which are dominated by amazingly detailed architecture that just begs to be explored, and surprisingly interesting notes and books that help flesh out the game's mythos.

The magical realism extends to your character, who slowly gains a number of supernatural powers as he finds mystical runes hidden throughout the world (the game tries to layer on some occult mumbo-jumbo to explain why you're searching for these powers, but it's pretty forgettable). The most important of these powers, by far, is the ability to "blink" across short distances, darting from one hiding spot to another without the risk of being seen, or warping up to high ledges and rooftops instantly. I ended up using this ability throughout the entire game—I loved the freedom of movement it allowed and the panoply of new, stealthy path options it opened up.

I also relied on Dark Vision, an ability that lets players see enemy guards and items through walls. It's a feature made all the more important because, for the most part, the game lacks any type of map or radar to orient you to your surroundings or the enemies that are trying to find you. This can lead to a lot of aimless wandering and accidental discovery by the guards if you don't proceed extremely carefully.

There's plenty of variety in the rest of the game's powers, including a very useful ability to briefly take control of animals and people to avoid detection and get into new areas. But what the "tech tree" has in breadth, it largely lacks in depth—each power only has two levels of advancement, and the second step often serves as a stronger version of the first. While I had grown much more powerful by the time I reached the end of the game, I also felt like there could have been greater plateaus of power that were left unexplored.

Corvo also has a handful of offensive superpowers available, but I didn't find them quite as useful. That's mostly because, for all the game's talk of letting players decide between stealth or action, Dishonored is ever-so-slightly tilted toward sneaking around over running in with guns blazing. The game's "chaos system" reprimands you for killing too many people by filling the world with shambling zombies (don't ask me to explain the backstory justification for this) and giving you a "worse" ending at the end of the game if you're too lethal. Further, the limited selection of projectile weapons in the game tend to be pretty inaccurate and limited in ammo, unless you're willing to invest heavily in upgrades later in the game.

For the most part, I found the selection of weapons and offensive abilities largely insufficient to handle the hordes of enemy guards that seemed to materialize out of nowhere every time I was spotted. Rather than hanging back and using cover to protect themselves, these guards tended to rush toward me in huge clumps, hacking with swords or simply stepping back a pace and firing a pistol directly into my face.

Handling this sort of mob from a first-person perspective with the somewhat clumsy combat controls usually felt more like a chore than a joy, and I found myself often reloading a recent save rather than trying to hack and shoot my way out of it. Other times I would simply dash away from the throng as fast as possible and blink myself to a nearby rooftop to get away, waiting for the guards to quickly lose interest in their pursuit once I was out of sight (in a few missions, I managed to leap in a boat and get carried away to safety even as the angry guards watched me and hurled projectiles from the shore).

If you rush through the handful of assassination missions that demarcate Dishonored, the game can end up feeling a bit short. But that would be largely missing the point. Each mission is filled with interesting side quests and plenty of hidden doodads to discover and collect, and the game seems to pride itself on the different ways you can complete necessary tasks.

To get by a wall of light, for instance, you might take away its power source. Or you could deactivate it with a security device, or sneak under it through a sewer tunnel, or take control of a rat and sneak through a hole in the wall. To sneak into a mansion, you might take out the guards at the front gate, or travel the rooftops to sneak into an open window, or eavesdrop on a conversation to obtain an invitation. And there's always a way to "eliminate" your current assassination target non-lethally, though the method is sometimes rather contrived and indirect. I imagine you could get through the game at least three times without completing a single mission precisely the same way.

And even though each mission centers on an assassination, the developers have found good ways to spice up the basic find-and-kill formula. One mission requires using some detective skills to determine which of three masked sisters is your actual target. Others will ask you to torture noblemen for crucial information, or figure out how to poison your target's drink while also protecting an insider informant, or determine which side to back in a morally ambiguous personal feud. Though the general outlines of each mission remain the same, you'll never feel like you know exactly what's going to be asked of you next.

Dishonored is the kind of game that makes you understand why sequels are so prevalent in this industry, because as soon as it's done you find yourself wanting to dive back into its rich and compelling world. For Arkane Studios to throw out all that work just for the sake of creating something new would be just as disappointing as trying to extend the world of a lesser game long after it has ceased to be interesting.

The Good

Intricate, detailed steampunk world that you can't help but get lost in

The games you play in those places aren't always fabulous but the worlds themselves are almost always worth the price of admission. I was going to pick this up regardless of reviews and I'm pleasantly surprised that many folks seem to like it a lot.

Edit: I realized Bethesda was just publishing. My comment stands, since I can't think of anything to replace it with

The games you play in those places aren't always fabulous but the worlds themselves are almost always worth the price of admission. I was going to pick this up regardless of reviews and I'm pleasantly surprised that many folks seem to like it a lot.

That'd be great if Bethesda developed the game. Bethesda didn't; Arkane (the Arx Fatalis developer) did.

more than a little worried to buy a Bethesda anything game (published or developed) on ps3. really time to pony up for an xbox controller for pc play (i'm no good at keyboard/mouse, it's a handicap i just have to live with).

That'd be great if Bethesda developed the game. Bethesda didn't; Arkane (the Arx Fatalis developer) did.

Sorry, my fanboy was showing. I'm better now.

That's cool. I understand that Bethesda has become associated with sandbox RPG's. And for good reason (Elder Scrolls series and lately, the Fallout series sans Black Isle). Bethsoft may just produce certain types of games in some cases, so they get associated with those types of games..

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Ditto. Hopefully sales soar, sending a message to all the game producers everywhere.

I'm with you. Still, I don't mind developers who do MP, so that MP gamers can get their fix. Just so long as there are dev's who give me my single player fix (Dishonored being a prime example).

Not a terrible conclusion, but not totally accurate either. The game is far more open ended, like the Elder Scrolls series. But, like BioShock, you can use any power at your disposal, and in any combination. The only linear path is at the beginning of the game, when the game is teaching you the basics of the overall mechanics.

All I can say is, don't buy this if you dislike single player RPG's. If you do like SPRPG's - this game rocks!!! The story is pretty typical, but the execution is superb.

more than a little worried to buy a Bethesda anything game (published or developed) on ps3. really time to pony up for an xbox controller for pc play (i'm no good at keyboard/mouse, it's a handicap i just have to live with).

Yep, I wouldn't spend another dime on a Bethesda PS3 release. Sadly, this only reinforces their horrible history of "support" for the PS3, but I've been burned too many times by them already. If it weren't for the abundance of resources available to waste on the average PC, I'm certain more people would feel the same way about their desktop releases.

My kind of stuff. Would I be better off getting this on the 360 or Windows, given I've got an iMac (3.1GHz i5, 1GB Radeon 6970M)?

Windows. With that config, you'll get better framerates and overall graphics.

For the record, I'm playing on Q9550 @ 3.8GHZ, 4GB RAM, AMD6950 (BIOS modded to a 6970), on a Dell 24" 1920x1200 based display and using a 360 controller. Game runs perfect with all details maxed and FXAA enabled.

How does a review of a stealth focused game have nothing on how good/believable the guard/enemy AI is in terms of awareness and response?

A stealth game lives and dies by the quality of the AI in it. Instead we get lyrical waxing about the creation of new worlds. A good point, but an unimportant one compared to the stealth mechanic.

From article. Answers part of your question I guess :

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For the most part, I found the selection of weapons and offensive abilities largely insufficient to handle the hordes of enemy guards that seemed to materialize out of nowhere every time I was spotted. Rather than hanging back and using cover to protect themselves, these guards tended to rush toward me in huge clumps, hacking with swords or simply stepping back a pace and firing a pistol directly into my face.

How does a review of a stealth focused game have nothing on how good/believable the guard/enemy AI is in terms of awareness and response?

A stealth game lives and dies by the quality of the AI in it. Instead we get lyrical waxing about the creation of new worlds. A good point, but an unimportant one compared to the stealth mechanic.

From article. Answers part of your question I guess :

Quote:

For the most part, I found the selection of weapons and offensive abilities largely insufficient to handle the hordes of enemy guards that seemed to materialize out of nowhere every time I was spotted. Rather than hanging back and using cover to protect themselves, these guards tended to rush toward me in huge clumps, hacking with swords or simply stepping back a pace and firing a pistol directly into my face.

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Enemy AI acts pretty stupid after discovering you

This would be the niggles i spoke of. If you play totally stealth, you don't have to deal with this type of AI. Essentially, you watch and kill/choke (your choice) out all enemies. Also, the game seems to prefer a stealth approach. Not bad, as you can be as aggressive as you like, but still being a push from the developers.

So, if you don't enjoy games like Thief or Splinter Cell, forget Dishonored.

Problem is what about those of us who are used to PC games and not dumbed down console controls. Somehow I doubt that game can be good at both especially as it's a 1st person view. Having very weird reaction to mouse is annoying as hell and would hardly be the first time a console port has issues with it (bethseda is hardly well known for good ports).

Problem is what about those of us who are used to PC games and not dumbed down console controls. Somehow I doubt that game can be good at both especially as it's a 1st person view. Having very weird reaction to mouse is annoying as hell and would hardly be the first time a console port has issues with it (bethseda is hardly well known for good ports).

an obvious shortcoming I've noticed so far (from watching not playing) is that aiming for things like teleportation seems like a hassle on thumbsticks, probably since it doesn't auto snap to valid objects. so frustrating to watch someone fiddle back and forth for a few seconds at every landing, and still end up missing the jump, then falling to their deaths or facing some angry mob of npcs below, while mkb players hop from ledge to ledge with ease. so I know what I'll be playing this on for sure, would not want to deal with that at all.

This is my bias speaking, but I wish this was 3rd person instead of 1st.

That will never happen as Arkane developpers openly say they are from the Looking Glass school of gameplay. Therefore, each of their 3 games (Ars Fatalis, Dark Messiah of blablablabla and Dishonored) is first-person only with a good deal of body awareness.

Cat Killer wrote:

Sounds like Deus Ex, down to the de facto stealth preference because of the clunky combat controls.

I haven't fought much in the game but I wouldn't say combats controls are clunky. They do work as well as in any FPS. Except that you don't have much ammunition to fight your way and enemies are good at dealing you tons of damage. Oh and you can't kick enemies like in Dark Messiah (best first person close combat game ever) to push them over some cliff. Being stealth or quick is de facto favored as it's likely to be less risky.

This is my bias speaking, but I wish this was 3rd person instead of 1st.

You just want to "cheat" by peering around corners and over objects while your character is completely hidden by them. I guess it sounds like there's a skill to let you do this anyway though.

I must admit that I'm terrible at first person stealth games, but have greatly enjoyed third person ones. That's probably because I'm terrible at stealth! I was able to trick myself into thinking I was ok at it in Deus Ex:HR, but that was only after picking up tons of stealth skills and constant use of extra info from the 3rd person POV.

Kyle Orland / Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in Pittsburgh, PA.